Emily Chang – Designer

Last day to get your number on the national Do Not Call list.

The Switala Foundation supports creativity and innovation in the arts and media.  Started in 2002 by my dear friend, Rebecca Bernstein, for her husband, Tim Switala, “a creative innovator, who dedicated his life to helping others think outside the box.”

The Goo Goo Dolls are performing at Darien Lake Performing Arts Center on August 26, 7 PM.  A dollar from every ticket will go to support the Switala Foundation.  “I think that someone who was that inspiring to us… to see this positive influence carry on through him and the work that he did is a pretty huge thing. The fact that his name and his energy can still be a catalyst for people to do new and creative things – well, that’s what it’s all about.”
–Robby Takac

Support creativity!  Learn more at the Switala Foundation website.

Driving two hours northeast to the edge of Lake Ontario to do a presentation at SUNY Oswego with MS.

Last week’s blackout gave moblogging its first real chance to provide grassroots coverage of a major news event says this piece. The result: Lots of digital photos appearing on weblogs taken in the blackout zone by people using digital phone/cameras. Travis Larson, spokesman for the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association: “This may be the first major news event in which camera phones helped deliver the story. And they’ve done so in real time.” Howard Rheingold: “This is a sign of things to come more so than a watershed event. The (moblog) coverage didn’t give me much better than what I could get on television.” But, says Rheingold, once camera phones offer better resolution and can stream video, moblogs will become much more interesting.

http://www.corante.com/communications/redir/28053.html

Write Robert MacMillan of the Washington Post, “no refrigeration, no subways, no smooth traffic flow, no air conditioning—well, at least the Internet worked.

So did the phones, at least in theory. That was the big message in the tech media’s coverage of the mega-blackout that took down the power grid serving much of the northeast United States and southern Canada yesterday.”

Read the rest of this article »

Power is back up in Ithaca, NY.  Check this link for blackout coverage on the web.  Yesterday, our power cut out at 4:11 pm like many on the east coast.  I was in the middle of a work email and was irked, thinking it was a fuse blowing out.  We looked out and heard neighbors commenting about the whole area losing power.  Z heard someone mention something about New York City.  That’s when we got out our hand-crank shortwave radio and tuned into a station bringing live street reports from Manhattan.  We were immediately suspicious of terrorism, particularly having seen a recent PBS special that described how certain extremist groups had been attempting hacks on America’s infrastructure technology, some of which is actually online.  My first thought was of E and friends in NY, hoping they were close to home and each other.  I imagined all the the poor people caught in the subways and elevators.  And, of course, all the stranded commuters and folks from the outer burroughs.  Just two days ago, it could have been Z and I stranded there.  Watching the footage of the masses walking across the bridges, I had to again question and confront 1. my lifelong desire to live in New York City and 2. my fears of being trapped on the island on foot with 8 million other people.

Taken on on Lexington Ave.